Sunday, February 14, 2016

Sunday morning's reflections for the first Sunday in Lent - related to the Bible readings in IBRA's Fresh from the Word for 2016

When
Moses led the people to freedom and the promised land and shared those Ten
Commandments the people had to cope with 40 years of wandering through the
wilderness. It was a time of hardship, a
time of difficulty, and a time of all sorts of things going wrong, and all
sorts of temptation. It took quite some
navigating to get through the wilderness wandering.

When
Jesus came up out of the Jordan in the strength of the Holy Spirit he went into
the wilderness for 40 days. It too was a
tough time, a time of hardship, and for him a time of very real
temptation. It took quite some
navigating to get through the time of temptation.

We
stand at the beginning of Lent. 40 days
of journeying towards Holy Week, Good Friday and Easter. And Our Bible readings through Lent invite us
to go on a journey that takes quite a bit of navigating. It’s a journey that involves Navigating good
and evil. It’s quite some journey. And if the first week of readings are
anything to go by quite tough at times.

More
than one person has said to me, I’m not sure what he’s on about! And I have to confess I’ve wondered too!

When
it comes to navigating we live in a Sat Nav age. You key in the destination and you follow
precise instructions. Go wrong and the
instructions will get you back on the right track. And it’s all there for you on a plate.

Even
if you use what one of the youngsters of one of the Scout leaders in a
priceless comment described as ‘a paper sat nav’ – an atlas, the map books we
use are accurate and precise so long as we follow them exactly.

I
have a feeling people think of the Bible as a Sat Nav – key in the destination
and it will get you there as you sit back and follow the instructions. Go wrong and it will set you right again.

I
don’t think the Bible is like that.

It’s
not too like to pick up on our course at Explore – though I hope this Tuesday
and next you join Michelle at Explore to explore the treasures of our faith in
all sorts of creative ways that can then feed into the Christian Arts Festival
in April.

Our
course on the Bible is called Making Good Sense of the Bible Together. It’s been great working on the course with
Faith Taylor. Last Tuesday some really
fascinating insights about the way the bible works as poetry touching on the
mysteries of life emerged through the discussion. But those insights were not spelled out in
the booklet that accompanies the course.
Someone was frustrated that the booklet had directed us to some very
difficult verses of the Bible and not given the answer we had arrived at.

Faith’s
response was superb – with some feeling and enthusiasm she said, ‘that’s the
whole point’. We’ve arrived at that
understanding because we have had the conversation and shared together. That’s the whole point of the course, she
said, very perceptively, We make Good Sense of the Bible together.

It’s
good to have a conversation about difficult passages in the Bible. Not so that someone can tell us what the
right answer is, but because in the conversation something emerges that touches
the mystery in the words of the Bible.

One
of the things that I think is a bit different about the IBRA bible study notes
is that they come from a mixture of different people with different experiences
of faith, different ways of reading the Bible and you won’t get just one clear
definitive point of view.

Think
of yourself as entering into a conversation as we share in navigating good and
evil, specially in these first readings with Julian Bond as we asked where does
evil come from and what is evil like today.

Instead
of taking us through one book of the Bible, we jump around different
texts. Some find that disconcerting –
and actually I like getting to grips with a whole book at a time. But I think it goes to something very
interesting about the Bible.

The
Bible is a collection of 66 books written by probably a lot more than 66
people. Many of the books have been
re-worked by other people, ordered and arranged and then put together into what
we see as the Bible. These are all
people of faith who have been touched by God as they have lived in the real
world and grappled with the very issues we grapple with today.

One
way to read the Bible is to look out for the way there’s almost a conversation
going on between different people in the Bible. Reading the Bible, looking at different
passages from different writers at different times is a bit like entering into
the conversation. The great thing about
that is that they have all journeyed this way before and they have all had to
Navigate Good and Evil.

Actually,
come to think of it: that’s another way of navigating today. Find someone who’s been there before and
follow their directions or let them show you the way. We are going to have a day of prayer thinking
of the churches of our area in our SW Midlands Area of the Federation down at
our Stapleton Road church in Bristol – it’s in a fascinating area of Bristol
and the church is really very much in the heart of inner city work. When, I think it was Shirley and Dee, were
going there they wanted help to get there – I gave them directions. But it took some finding! Find someone who’s been there before!

One
thing I noticed in Julian Barnes notes is that he says, almost each day, In my
opinion. This is what I think. At first that riled me. And then I thought
that’s interesting. He’s inviting us
into the conversation.

So,
now’s a moment to enter into the conversation.
What do you make of this question Julian Barnes has been asking: Where
does evil come from? Navigating good and
evil is quite some challenge. What do
you make of evil? How do you begin to
answer that question or maybe how do you begin to grapple with that question?

Sharing ideas

Let
me enter into the conversation and share my thoughts.

One
of the things that came out of our Explore evening last week was the thought
that so much of the Bible is in poetry and deals with things that are beyond
our understanding by using picture language, metaphor and the like. The Bible
uses different ways of thinking about evil – different people at different
times have different insights. I think
it’s helpful not to elevate one to be the defintivie account of evil but to
hold them together as different ways of thinking of something that is
unthinkable.

I
look around at the world and it can be wonderful – the news this week that a
prediction made by Einstein a hundred years ago has actually been seen is
remarkable! But I also look around at
the world with its conflict, its poverty and it’s pretty grim. What do you make of it?

I
think I do find it helpful just to think of evil. There are things that are pretty horrible,
beyond words – they happen out there in the world at large, sometimes they come
closer to home. And it can leave you
thinking life is ****. The word I have
heard more than once this week rhymes with Kit and for emphasis with Kite. However you explain it, it’s a reality – and
I for one find it helpful in the Lord’s prayer to pray, ‘deliver us from evil’.

Just
‘evil’ Sometimes the Bible speaks of
‘the evil one’ – that’s how some translators translate that line in the Lord’s
Prayer. In Matthew and Luke it is the
devil who tempts Jesus in the wilderness and in Mark it is Satan. You can have a field day exploring the way
those words are used and not use in the Bible.
It’s not the only way of thinking of evil. But I for one find it helpful as one
way. Evil can come in the most personal
of ways. You know exactly what you
should do, but something gets at you, niggles away – it is very personal. That’s the devil at work. The Lord’s prayer says it all – lead us not
into temptation.

There’s
a lot of imagery of monsters – in the depths, the chaos of the sea, the lion
that’s prowling around to devour. All
imagery that captures the awfulness of evil around – not least the
destructiveness of those bent on terror aimed at Christians and also aimed at
other Muslims too in the Middle East at the moment.

Those
last few words of Romans 8 speak of heights and depths that you think separate
us from God – that language of soaring into the heights or plumbing the depths
captures something of the awfulness of what can happen to us. Mass of imagery around like that.

And
then it speaks of principalities and powers, cosmic powers. That’s an image I find really helpful in
understanding the way horrible bad stuff gets a hold of institutions and the
very fabric of society and the way things work. Individually we don’t want to
feed climate change and destroy the wordl.
But we are part of a system that is devouring the earth’s resources and
it’s hard to extricate ourselves.
There’s a web.

Julian
Bond introduces us to one more thought.
A difficult thought. An
intriguing thought. Evil happens in the
world that is the world of God’s creation.
Maybe we shouldn’t think of that bad and all that goes wrong as a force
equal and opposite to God, are a tiny bit less than God but pretty
awesome. Maybe things we sometimes
categorise as evil are simploy part of the way God’s world works.

Those
gravitational waves came from the collision of two black holes so many billion
years ago. A cataclysmic event. It is out of cataclysmic events that new
stars are born. IT is the nature of the
woirld that cataclysmic things happen.
There’s that kind of insigt in Isasiah 45:5-7

I am
the Lord, and there is no other.
I form light and create darkness,
I make weal and create woe;
I the Lord do all these things.

How
do you begin to get your mind round that?
It was a way of thinking common in the time leading up to the exile and
through the exile. You see it in Jeremiah. When the prophets use the language of
judgment think in today’s terms of ‘consequence’. Jeremiah saw the devastation of a generation
that had to live through the most awful destruction as God’s judgment working
out. See it as consequence – and some of
Jeremiah’s insights may have something to say to today. The consequence of the wars we waged in Iraq
and Afghanistan and more recently Libya is being worked out at the moment and
it may last a generation and more.

My
mind is beginning to spin. There comes a
point when that picture by Munch says it all – The Scream. I just want to go ‘aasrgh’. I can’t cope with all this.

That’s
the point when you need to turn to God in prayer.

Our
journeying navigating good and evil is going somewhere. It’s leading us towards Holy Week, the
Passion of Christ and Easter. The
readings this week take us to Jesus.

What
makes Holy Week, the Passion and Easter so important to me is that at the heart
of our Christian faith is the convication that God does not leave us on our
own. God comes alongside us and in Jesus
shares in the awfulness of the world in the inhumanity of humanity at its
worst.

The
God I believe in is the God who in Jesus has been there before. More than that the risen Christ promises us
something for the journey we have to take.

Don’t
think of the Bible as a Sat nav that simply will tell you how to get through
life in instructions that simply have to be followed.

Think
of it as a conversation – listen to people who have travelled this way before,
grappled with these problems and come up with a way through them, a way of
navigating good and evil.

But
there’s one more way of thinking of this journey the Bible opens up for
us. The best way of navigating is when
someone says, I’ve travelled that way before, I’ll take you. And they accompany you on the journey.

That’s
the promise Jesus makes – at that last supper on the eve of his crucifixion.

‘I
will not leave you orphaned;

I am
coming to you.

In a
little while the world will no longer see me,

but
you will see me;

because
I live, you also will live.

And
I will ask the Father,

and
he will give you another Advocate,

a
Comforter, One who will be with you every step of the way

I
will ask the Father

And
he will give you anbother Comforter

to be
with you for ever.

This
is the Spirit of truth,

So
overwhelmed by all this talk of evil – take heart, remember that promise of
Jesus – I am with you always to the end of the age.

As
we draw to a close maybe Psalm 73 is one of those prayers from the Bible that
can resonate for us.

It’s
one of those psalms that exprsses the scream – the wretchedness we sometimes
can feel … not least when we look at a world where evil seems to have the last
word and win the day.

Truly
God is good to the upright,
to those who are pure in heart.
But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled;
my steps had nearly slipped.
For I was envious of the arrogant;
I saw the prosperity of the wicked.

The Psalm goes on to despair at the way evil has a hold.

Ultimately,
the Psalmist senses that such evil does not have the last word. The victory is God’s. Navigating Good and evil through Lent our
journey takes us through the cross to resurrection victory.

So
these words can become our prayer …

Psalm 73:21-28

When
my soul was embittered,
when I was pricked in heart,
I was stupid and ignorant;
I was like a brute beast towards you.
Nevertheless I am continually with you;
you hold my right hand.
You guide me with your counsel,
and afterwards you will receive me with honour.
Whom have I in heaven but you?
And there is nothing on earth that I desire other than
you.
My flesh and my heart may fail,
but God is the strength of my heart and my portion for
ever.

Indeed, those who are far from you will perish;
you put an end to those who are false to you.
But for me it is good to be near God;
I have made the Lord God my refuge,
to tell of all your works.

Navigating
good and evil … one thing is sure, we are not on our own on the journey, it’s
not just that others have walked this way before us, good though it is to enter
into conversation with them. God in
Jesus Christ by the strengthening of the Spirit walks the journey with us.

I am
continually with you;
you hold my right hand.
You guide me with your counsel,
and afterwards you will receive me with honour.

For
me in navigating good and evil

it
is good to be near God;
I have made the Lord God my refuge,
to tell of all your works.

Sunday evening's reflections on Romans 7 and 8 - the first of a series for Lent: Navigating Good and Evil, related to the IBRA Bible reading notes, Fresh From the Word 2016When
Moses led the people to freedom and the promised land and shared those Ten
Commandments the people had to cope with 40 years of wandering through the
wilderness. It was a time of hardship, a
time of difficulty, and a time of all sorts of things going wrong, and all
sorts of temptation. It took quite some
navigating to get through the wilderness wandering.

When
Jesus came up out of the Jordan in the strength of the Holy Spirit he went into
the wilderness for 40 days. It too was a
tough time, a time of hardship, and for him a time of very real
temptation. It took quite some
navigating to get through the time of temptation.

We
stand at the beginning of Lent. 40 days
of journeying towards Holy Week, Good Friday and Easter. And Our Bible readings through Lent invite us
to go on a journey that takes quite a bit of navigating. It’s a journey that involves Navigating good
and evil. It’s quite some journey. And if the first week of readings are
anything to go by quite tough at times.

More
than one person has said to me, I’m not sure what he’s on about! And I have to confess I’ve wondered too!

When
it comes to navigating we live in a Sat Nav age. You key in the destination and you follow
precise instructions. Go wrong and the
instructions will get you back on the right track. And it’s all there for you on a plate.

Even
if you use what one of the youngsters of one of the Scout leaders in a
priceless comment described as ‘a paper sat nav’ – an atlas, the map books we
use are accurate and precise so long as we follow them exactly.

I
have a feeling people think of the Bible as a Sat Nav – key in the destination
and it will get you there as you sit back and follow the instructions. Go wrong and it will set you right again.

I
don’t think the Bible is like that.

It’s
not too like to pick up on our course at Explore – though I hope this Tuesday
and next you join Michelle at Explore to explore the treasures of our faith in
all sorts of creative ways that can then feed into the Christian Arts Festival
in April.

Our
course on the Bible is called Making Good Sense of the Bible Together. It’s been great working on the course with
Faith Taylor. Last Tuesday some really
fascinating insights about the way the bible works as poetry touching on the
mysteries of life emerged through the discussion. But those insights were not spelled out in
the booklet that accompanies the course.
Someone was frustrated that the booklet had directed us to some very
difficult verses of the Bible and not given the answer we had arrived at.

Faith’s
response was superb – with some feeling and enthusiasm she said, ‘that’s the
whole point’. We’ve arrived at that
understanding because we have had the conversation and shared together. That’s the whole point of the course, she
said, very perceptively, We make Good Sense of the Bible together.

It’s
good to have a conversation about difficult passages in the Bible. Not so that someone can tell us what the
right answer is, but because in the conversation something emerges that touches
the mystery in the words of the Bible.

One
of the things that I think is a bit different about the IBRA bible study notes
is that they come from a mixture of different people with different experiences
of faith, different ways of reading the Bible and you won’t get just one clear
definitive point of view.

Think
of yourself as entering into a conversation as we share in navigating good and
evil, specially in these first readings with Julian Bond as we asked where does
evil come from and what is evil like today.

Instead
of taking us through one book of the Bible, we jump around different
texts. Some find that disconcerting –
and actually I like getting to grips with a whole book at a time. But I think it goes to something very
interesting about the Bible.

The
Bible is a collection of 66 books written by probably a lot more than 66
people. Many of the books have been
re-worked by other people, ordered and arranged and then put together into what
we see as the Bible. These are all
people of faith who have been touched by God as they have lived in the real
world and grappled with the very issues we grapple with today.

One
way to read the Bible is to look out for the way there’s almost a conversation
going on between different people in the Bible. Reading the Bible, looking at different
passages from different writers at different times is a bit like entering into
the conversation. The great thing about
that is that they have all journeyed this way before and they have all had to
Navigate Good and Evil.

Actually,
come to think of it: that’s another way of navigating today. Find someone who’s been there before and
follow their directions or let them show you the way. We are going to have a day of prayer thinking
of the churches of our area in our SW Midlands Area of the Federation down at
our Stapleton Road church in Bristol – it’s in a fascinating area of Bristol
and the church is really very much in the heart of inner city work. When, I think it was Shirley and Dee, were
going there they wanted help to get there – I gave them directions. But it took some finding! Find someone who’s been there before!

One
thing I noticed in Julian Barnes notes is that he says, almost each day, In my
opinion. This is what I think. At first that riled me. And then I thought
that’s interesting. He’s inviting us
into the conversation.

So,
now’s a moment to enter into the conversation.
What do you make of this question Julian Barnes has been asking: Where
does evil come from? Navigating good and
evil is quite some challenge. What do
you make of evil? How do you begin to
answer that question or maybe how do you begin to grapple with that question?

Sharing ideas

I
felt I wanted to enter into the conversation this week as well.

Two
passages caught my eye, though maybe the way I read them is a little different.

When
it comes to navigating good and evil Romans 7 and 8 are very powerful for me.

They
kind of ring true.

Paul
has in Romans set out his take on the Gospel of Christ.

it
is the power of God for salvation to everyone who has faith, to the Jew first
and also to the Greek. Romans 1:17

He
offers an indictment of Nero’s Rome – then acknowledges we all get things wrong
but God sets things right

For
there is no distinction,

23since all have
sinned and fall short of the glory of God;

24they are now
justified by his grace as a gift,

through
the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,

25whom God put
forward as a sacrifice of atonement by his blood,

effective
through faith.

Three
wonderful pictures – from the law court, the slave market and the temple. A wonderful transformation for those who come
into the presence of Jesus.

There’s
something wonderful in the way we can all share in this new life – a life of
grace

Therefore,
since we are justified by faith,

we have
peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,

2through whom we
have obtained access to this grace

in
which we stand;

and
we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God.

3And not only that,
but we also boast in our sufferings,

knowing
that suffering produces endurance,

4and endurance
produces character,

and
character produces hope,

5and hope does not
disappoint us,

because
God’s love has been poured into our hearts

through the Holy Spirit that has been given to
us.

This
is wonderful poetry – I have rearranged the words into short lines!

Powerful
stuff.

And
we share in the death and resurrection of Jesus.

Then
we come to Romans 7

It’s
great. You would think it would be
wonderful. But sometimes it isn’t.

Something
gets in and niggles away and goes wrong.

I do
not understand my own actions.

For
I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.

16Now
if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good.

17But in fact it is
no longer I that do it,

but
sin that dwells within me. 1

8For I know that
nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh.

I can will what is right, but I cannot do it.

19For I do not do
the good I want,

but
the evil I do not want is what I do.

20Now if I do what I
do not want, it is no longer I that do it,

but
sin that dwells within me.

You
know exactly what you should do but you don’t do it.

This
rings true for me. Not least caught up
in the system. I know I want to look
after the environment but for all sorts of reasons that are also good I find
myself using my car again. I want to
break free from the economic system, but I find myself caught up in the system
too.

This
is one of those moments when the genius of William Tyndale with his ear and eye
fo rhte English language comes into its own in the Authorised Version.

The
commonest 20 words in the English language are all the little ones – they tend
to be the oldst. So many words are
single syllable words in Shakespeare and also in the AV. You can almost weigh them. 2 syllable words are twice the weight of
single syllable words.

The
good that I would I do not.

The
evil that I would not

That
I do.

Wow
powerful stuff.

And
it touches each of us.

Then
you come to Romans 8.

I
counted them. Count them for yourself. I
came to 20 references.

It
is in Romans 8 that Paul for the firfst time in Romans talks of the Holy
Spirit.

This
is where in navigating good and evil the Christian faith becomes good news,
gospel.

We
are not on our own in making the journey.

We
have a strength from beyond ourselves in the Holy Spirit of God who is
alongside us.

There
are times of groaning when we are
navigating good and evil. And we cannot
cope.

It
is at those times that God is with us, the Holy Sp;irit is the strength we
need.

There
is therefore now no condemnation

for
those who are in Christ Jesus.

2For the law of the
Spirit of life in Christ Jesus

has set you free from the law of sin and
of death.

It’s
language that works for me.

There
is a freedom. No condemnation. We are forgiven.

More
than that we have that strength of the Spirit with us.

There
is a groaning in creation – a groaning that we are all too aware of. But it is the groaning that heralds something
new, new birth, the groaning that is labour pains.

It
has to be one of my favourite verses – we have a presence with us in the Spirit
of God, unseen yet very real.

26 Likewise
the Spirit helps us in our weakness;

for
we do not know how to pray as we ought,

but
that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.

Navigating
good and evil.

For
the journey there is the presence of the love of God in Christ – and nothing
can separate us from that love.

Who
will separate us from the love of Christ?

Will
hardship, or distress,

or
persecution, or famine,

or
nakedness, or peril, or sword?

37No, in all these
things we are more than conquerors

through
him who loved us.

38For I am convinced
that neither death, nor life,

nor
angels, nor rulers,

nor
things present, nor things to come,

nor
powers, 39nor height, nor depth,

nor
anything else in all creation,

will
be able to separate us from the love of God

in
Christ Jesus our Lord.

These
are the things that make for the nastiness in our world – as much as in Paul’s
world. And there is nothing in all
creation that can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

So
then, what next.

Navigating
good and evil – we have a path to follow – spelled out in Romans 12

Sunday, February 7, 2016

It’s
good to welcome everyone to our worship today and to give a special welcome to
friends from St Luke’s as our two churches once again get together to share
worship. It begs a couple of questions. What’s the point of getting together to
worship?

It’s
a bit like different parts of a family getting together. Each of our churches is made up of a
different set of people. We do things
differently. We think differently. We have a different history behind us. But we share one faith in Jesus Christ as our
Lord and Saviour and we are part of the one church that is his body not just on
earth but here in this part of Cheltenham.
That makes it important to get to know each other, to share in different
ways and above all to sense we have the same mission to serve and make real the
love of Christ in our community.

So,
in the interests of getting to know one another let me tell you a little bit
about Highbury. In the early 1800’s
there was a real movement of the Spirit throughout the land and in many, many
churches to spread the Christian faith.
Among those who shared that passion were some who belonged to Highbury
Congregational College in Islington in North London. At the time new towns were springing up in
different parts of the country and they wanted to plant churches in those new
developments. By 1827 Cheltenham was
rapidly growing and ripe for church planting.
So it was that they teamed up with well-established Congregational
churches in Stroud and Painswick to plant a church here in Cheltenham.

They
purchased a church building that had been put up about fifteen years before but
the church congregation had come to nought.
It was on what is now Grosvenor Street – with Cheltenham’s Open Door at
one end and Malham’s auction house at the other.

With
preachers riding over on horse back form Painswick and from Stroud services
were held Sunday by Sunday and the building took on the name of the college
back in Islington – it was known as Highbury Chapel.

That
gives rise to the question – when’s a chapel not a chapel? When it becomes a church.

After
they had been holding services for five years there came a moment when about a
dozen people who were coming regularly felt ready to make a commitment to each
other, share their own confession of faith in God and Jesus Christ as Lord and
Saviour and enter into partnership with each other to form a Church. They called in Highbury Congregational
Church.

What
they did is right at the heart of our understanding of what a church is. Our first records don’t actually use the
word. But lots of churches do. They made a covenant with each other. What bound them together as a church family
was a sense of partnership in a shared faith, a shared gospel, a shared mission
and a shared vision.

They
shared in a ‘covenant’ together.

That
goes right to the heart of the Bible story and what it means to be the people
of God in God’s world.

From
the very outset the people of God are in a partnership with each other, in a
partnership with God, with a shared faith, a shared message, a shared mission
and a shared vision.

Last
year at Highbury we had a focus on prayer.
This year we have a focus on the Bible.
A good number of us are following a Bible reading plan with the IBRA and
using Bible reading notes called Fresh From the Word.

This
week we have been reading through the Ten Commandments. I can remember at school committing them to
memory from the Authorised Version of Exodus 20. I couldn’t recite that now – but I do
sometimes try to go through the 10 and get them in the right order!

Two
things struck me in reading through those commandments one by one over the last
few days in Deuteronomy 5.

First,
the commandments are an expression of God’s covenant with his people.

Hear, O Israel, the statutes and
ordinances that I am addressing to you today; you shall learn them and observe
them diligently. 2The Lord our God made a covenant with us at Horeb.

God’s
covenant is not just a historical thing - what is significant here is that the
covenant partnership God makes is a living thing made with living people –

3Not with our ancestors did the Lord make
this covenant, but with us, who are all of us here alive today.

That
for me is the most exciting thing of all about thinking of Church as a covenant
partnership. The partnership we are in
is not a human one – it’s a partnership that’s initiated by God – and it is a
living partnership as God is in a relationship with each one of us today.

We
shouldn’t think of the 10 commandments as way to gain points and gain favour
with God – they are simply the expression of that partnership God delights in
having with us, a partnership that draws us together with each other too.

The
whole story of the Old Testament is the story of God’s wonderful partnership
with his people in covenant together.
And that reaches its climax with the new covenant that Jesus ushers in,
written on the heart, deep within us. A
covenant partnership. And again, the
commandments are not a means of winning favour with God, keeping on the right
side of God, they are an expression of that partnership.

10 2
1 The ten commandments are summed up in 2 – Love God, love your neighbour. The two are summed up in one. Do to others as you would have others do to
you. And they all boil down to a new
commandment ‘that you love one another’.
One word emerges – love.

That’s
the first thing that comes home to me – that the commandments are an expression
of that wonderful living partnership we have with God.

And
the second – is that they are not a burden.
They are not a burden because they are for people who are free. That’s a wonderful insight for us all. It’s in the context of the commandment about
observing the Sabbath day that this becomes important …

15Remember
that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you
out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm; therefore the Lord
your God commanded you to keep the sabbath day.

The
commandments give a framework for people who are free to live their freedom to
the full. That’s why there is a rhythm
to life that calls for a breathing space – the value of the Sabbath day in that
rhythm of activity.

Jennifer
Smith in our IBRA notes quotes Walter Breugemann, an Old Tesatment scholar, who
describes Sabbath-keeping as an act of cultural-political resistance. “His observation is that the culture of
twenty-first-century Western life treats people like machines to be worked and
used, we become commodities to be traded and exploited in a never-ending 24
hour news and economic cycle that prevents us from being present to each other,
let alone to God.”

Treasure
the Sabbath day’s rest – or campaign for it – it’s what sets you free!

And
freedom is at the heart of the partnership Christ draws us into. Don’t allow the commandments to become a
straitjacket – instead see them as an expression of a covenant partnership and
see them as an expression of the freedom God gives us all – a freedom that has
a framework that sets us free.

And for us as a church family at Highbury that's important too. We are sometimes described as a 'Free Church'. For us that means that we are free from the state as we believe in a separation of church and state, we are free from bishops, councils and synods as we gather together in the presence of God in Christ to shape all that we do together.

So covenanted together in a partnership with each other and a partnership with God we are free in Christ to follow the guiding of the Spirit in shaping all we do as a Church family. A selection of verses from Galatians 5 and 6 captures that spirit of freedom.

For freedom Christ has set us free.

Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit
again to a yoke of slavery.

For you were called to freedom, brothers
and sisters;

only do not use your freedom as an
opportunity for self-indulgence,

but through love become slaves to one
another.

For the whole law is summed up in a single
commandment,

‘You shall love your neighbour as
yourself.’

If, however, you bite and devour one
another,

take care that you are not consumed by one
another.

By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is

love, joy,

peace, patience,

kindness, generosity,

faithfulness, gentleness,

and self-control.

There is no law against such things.

And those who belong to Christ Jesus have
crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

If we live by the Spirit, let us also be
guided by the Spirit.

Let us not become conceited, competing
against one another, envying one another.

Bear one another’s burdens,

and in this way you will fulfil the law of
Christ.

That
covenant partnership that makes us church and the commandments that are an
expression of that covenant partnership?

That
framework for freedom that boils down to love that’s prepared to bear one
another’s burdens?

None
of it is possible in our own strength.
Let’s not think of the commandments as something to struggle with: let’s
think of them as the out-working of the presence of God within us, as the fruit
of the Holy Spirit.

Shaping our Church for tomorrow

Our sermons on Sunday mornings are exploring the way we can make that a reality.

Mapping the Church of the Future

As we re-shape the life of our church and dream dreams for the future of Highbury we are reading through Acts on Sunday evenings. Our series of sermons with the title 'Mapping the Church of the Future' is a 21st Century view of Acts.